Unbelief to Freedom.

-You are Beautiful. You are loved.
-I know, but I don't feel it sometimes, I just don't get it.
-You are loved
-I don't understand...I'm not!
-You are loved. Just believe it. You are simply loved.
This was the conversation I had with God last night whilst praying.

This week in DTS has been "Freedom week." We talked about original design (how God intended us to be created) and how strongholds in our lives can hinder us from living out our uniqueness in Christ. Last night the Harpenden staff (some DTS some not) prayed over us individually asking the Lord how HE sees us and what was one thing holding us back from that.

The Lord showed me/the staff that:
•I am LOVED. I cannot love others unless I am accepting that love of Christ, believing it, and living and doing everything out of pure, 1 Corinthians 13 -kind-of-love.
•I am a bringer of peace.
•I am full of joy, and sing songs to the Lord.
•I bring a refreshing and unique perspective to people, and they want to be around me.
•any many more beautiful pictures, and words!

As the staff prayed for my strongholds, the word God gave was "Unbelief." Because of my past, and my insecurities, I have a hard time accepting words of affirmation. This was made very clear to me within the first five minutes from the conversation I had with God. He just wants me to simply embrace the fact that I am loved, accept the affirmation given by people, and walk out in that same love!
I prayed with the staff and the freedom I felt was so clear and so beautiful and light! I am thankful for this time I had and for the Lord using so many awesome people to speak into my life so far during this school.

This weekend we are going on a short local outreach to the East End of London (Bow). We will be partnering with a church and another missionary organization (The Eden project) and sleeping in the church, serving them. I will bring my guitar and we will have lots of amazing fellowship - British style :) I hope that I am able to apply some of what I've learned this week and what God has been teaching me to the people of London.

What a blessing it is to walk in freedom of the Love of Christ :)
With love,
Rachel

1 Corinthians 13(NIV)

13 If I speak in the tongues^[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. ² If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. ³ If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,^[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
⁸ Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. ⁹ For we know in part and we prophesy in part, ¹⁰ but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. ¹¹ When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. ¹² For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
¹³ And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.